SaNiTY
by Yin-yang Yazmine
Summary: Sanity, what is that? I don't know where I'm headed, but I do know why I'm traveling.We- well actually I, need to understand how three souls can share one body, I can't stay blind and unknowing forever, I wa-need to understand, I need to take my own path and is 'home' isn't my home,it isn't my destiny it never was,I will travel forward, We will go forward.
1. The Pack

**Chapter One- The Pack**

* * *

 **Midnight's POV:**

Dawn streaked the sky in faint bands of red, pink and lavender, while the branches of the gigantic oak trees swayed in the wind,creating a soft and familiar rustling that quickly mixed with the singing and chirping of various bird Pokémon.

My steps were almost noiseless as I made my way through the forest green. My eyes kept on closing involuntary as exhaustion weighed down on my shoulders, and I wondered again why I had gone for a walk instead of sleeping like everybody else.

"Good morning." I muttered.

 _ **Morning,**_ Nightmare yawned from inside my head, she sounded exhausted as well despite not having done anything during my walk.

I blinked trying to stay awake, forcing my tired legs to move faster as I thought of the well-deserved rest that awaited me.

A flash of purple fur and the sound of a tiny heartbeat pushed my sleepiness away. Immediately I dropped into a crouch and made my way through the undergrowth trying to stay silent as I neared a distracted rattata that was practically begging to be cuaght, the mouse froze sensing something before continuing to nibble a seed,however its shoulders were tense and the normal-type seemed ready to flee at any given moment, not willing to let my catch flee,I sprang forward, the rattata zipped into the grass the moment my paws left the I gave chase always a bit behind it,the violet rodent led me through the forest and squeaked as it ducked into a tiny ice cavern.

Hissing I dived behind it and madly tried to flush the purple mouse out of hiding, but it was hidden too deeply in its I jumped onto one of the icy shelves created by the Ice-covered-rock and waited, ready to pounce on the rattata the moment it put a paw out.

I shivered the cold that emanated from the stone pierced my thick black pelt, slowly seeping into my skin.I waited trembling until the sun had completely risen over the nearby mountains,sighing I sprang off the icy ledge and carefully peered into the hole,my good nocturnal vision saw...nothing; the cavern was empty.

I sprayed poison around myself and glared at my reflection, who proceeded to glare back with an icy green gaze before it distorted due to the mixing of the dawn light that flooded the sky,the thin wispy shadows that fell on the spiky ice-covered-rock and the darkness and light of Our Our mirror image was nothing more than a silhouette,a stretched silhouette with thin spinity legs and a huge round body.

I laughed at the over exaggeration of Our features and stared at my own breath; now turned into a tiny white cloud that billowed up into the air.

 _ **Your in a good mood,**_ Nightmare noted.

"And you haven't said a single curse!" I chuckled for a bit before stopping as my eyes demanded rest,I yawned and stretched kneading the ground with my large furry paws.

 _ **Eh, the day's still young, there'll be plenty of time for swearing.**_

I bounded through the thinning grass, completely unaware of where I was going until it was too late. I leapt back as my paws hit the water, it wasn't cold, but I shivered anyways, seeing the lake in a lovely blood and guts hue, instead of the usual blue.

My vision blurred and became tinted with red, I couldn't move, couldn't breath, I could only hear wicked laughter and smell my own sour fear as I tried in vain to fight against a monster.

 _ **Midnight!**_ Nightmare's voice sounded distant and ripplely as if she were underwater, yet it was enough to snap me out of my memory.

Jerking my head upwards, I kept my eyes focused on a cloud and I backed away trying to control my just noticed, rapid pulse and breathing.

 _ **You ok? Do...you want me to take over?**_

Taking deep breaths I politely shook my head and turned around staring at the nearby trees before charging into the greenery. My large black paws kicked up leaves, dirt and other forest waste as I moved among the trees, I ducked under a fallen oak, startling a few sentrets in the process and ran around the gigantic moss covered rock that was placed in the dead center of our trail.I pushed myself forward for a few more meters and tumbled into the clearing,slightly dazed I growled softly as the sunlight shone into my eyes.

Sweat clung to my fur and I stumbled to my paws before shaking myself free of toxic substance .The exhaustion returned to my legs and I nearly fell forwards thanks to my ears dropping and my long messy tail dragging in the dirt as I trudged towards the bramble bush that served as a den, slipping through the too-wide-for-me entrance.I swayed on my paws,feeling as if my legs would snap at any given moment,asI searched for a possible place to rest.

Due to the rarity of Nightmare or I sleeping in camp, We had no nest and on days like this when We decided to return to camp and rest We usually rested next to Raiden,Ariada and in Nightmare's case with Link,but today they had already left to hunt, leaving me with just Caleo...

 _ **Are you seriously going to sleep next to her?**_

"Yeah, I guess I will, moss isn't as comfy as a bunch of warm fur."

Nightmare muttered something I couldn't understand as I made my way towards the exceptionally large flareon.

Caleo's rusty brown sides rose with each breath, and her eyes rolled in her head as she dreamed. I crawled towards the fire-type and snuggled into her thick brown and yellow fur, praying that she wouldn't be angry later on. The warmth and softness of her fur made me feel the sleepiness even more and Nightmare's angry muttering faded into the background.

* * *

By the time I woke up, the sun was peeking through the cracks of the den, giving the bramble bush a magical kind of glow.

I got up carefully freezing as I felt Caleo's warm fluffy body shift, the flareon murmured in her sleep and rolled. Allowing myself to breath, I carefully stepped out of the mossy nest and jumped through the large round exit.

The day looked promising, tree branches swaying in the warm breeze, bracken and ferns unfurled themselves in the western edge of camp, seemingly glowing in the sunshine.I purred and stopped wondering how long this peace would last.

 _ **This place will be like home until Caleo wakes up, better take advantage of it.**_

"I just got out of the Mindscape."

 _ **Yes, but you've said yourself the Mindscape is the closest you've got to home.**_

"I know...but today has an optimistic bribe don't you think?"

 _ **You aren't going to mope around again are you?**_

"I promise I won't mope around." I say going around the bramble bush and picking the clearest less torn-filled route out of camp via the east proved difficult due to the lack of eeveelutions walking and following a specific route though the plants, but somehow I managed to get through with only a few scratches.

I didn't know what was with today but the forest was bright, sun beams filtering through the canopy creating a pattern on the forest floor that I could only describe as a 'leaf dapple',the leaves and grass sparkled with evaporating dew, and everything smelled warm and filled with and other minor creatures moved among the plants, filling the air with rustling,chirping,and of this was evidence of New-leaf transforming into Green-leaf.

 _ **The Equinox is almost here!** _ Nightmare mewed excited.

"I'll never get why the Equinox is so important to you."

 _ **Its tradition passed down from generation to generation in Relta, so of course it matters to me.**_

"I know but,do you really think that burning things and praying to a god that we don't know actually exsists is a good thing?"

I _**don't care for the results, I just participate cause its tradition.**_

"You weren't even born in Relta!"

 _ **I** **was never born, I was created; but what about it?**_

"It just isn't your birth culture."

 _ **Maybe it isn't but who knows...maybe it is Our culture.** _ Nightmare didn't give me time to answer. _**Remember the story about Cloudberry and Ryewhisker?**_

"Kind of," I mumbled already losing about forbidden lovers were always predictable, they either got caught, were forced to fight each other,ran away, or one of them died.

 _ **Their half-pack kits were said to have been taken to Silvta after Cloudberry died.**_

"Your point?"

 _ **They say that legends come from the truth so who knows...maybe there is Relta blood in Us.**_

I sighed and instead focussed on a blade of grass that bobbed back and forth in the breeze,and dropped to the floor stalking it, quick and light on my paws before pouncing and happily grasping it between my teeth before I began rolling around in the grass,lying on my back to watch the pidgeys fluttering in the trees.

"Why can't it be like this everyday?"

 _ **Because most days,you stay in the Mindscape while I wander around and take care of Our body while trying to avoid the shit going on at Camp, and help with you deal with a lot of unpleasant memories as well,while pushing my own negative emotions away...**_ Nightmare trailed off and I growled swishing my tail,flattening my ears and dropping my blade of grass.

 _ **Hey, don't be like that. Today's a nice day, why don't We go and wander through the woods with a smile on Our face?Let's try to be white eyes, for a while.**_

I nodded unenthusiastically due that in my opinion being a white soul was stupid, they were too happy to the point that it was better considered as mania,and while I had only met one white eyes-a houndour during a pack gathering; his endless happiness had been enough to allow me to decide that white eyes were the most bullshit crazy kind of souls.

I rolled around in the grass a few more times before getting back to my paws and ducking into the undergrowth.

"Why do you want me to be a white eye?" I ask Nightmare as I wandered through the forest in opposite direction of the lake."If I were one,I wouldn't have gotten lonely and sad and there would be no reason for you to exist."

 _ **Eh,**_

I glanced around looking for something interesting, despite all the decoration the forest to me looked just as static as the Mindscape, there wasn't anything else to do than just stay in Nightmare's company.

"I got no idea of what I want to do!" I complained, before stopping to investigate a small creek that snaked its way through the woodland. Nightmare took a moment to reply, as if she too were contemplating the little stream.

 _ **I don't remember this creek.**_

"You don't?" I mewed surprised, scampering over to a little waterfall and following the twisting,winding water path."I have a feeling that I've seen this river before."

Eventually the river came to a stop and I froze, wondering where the fuck I was.

Where are We?" I asked looking around for any familiar landmarks before scrambling up a tree to get a better view. Perched on a relatively low branch I breathed out seeing the mountains and the lake and rows and rows of trees all a good distance from where We were,it was quite the south side of the forest thinned out, way too much to be considered natural. The lush green turned to an unappealing brown, the trees looked like skeletons, thin and dark, the ground was a mix of dead matter and brown sun-hardened mud imprinted with the large paw prints.  
Then it hit me like a very large rock.

"This isn't our territory!" I shrieked nearly falling off the branch "We're on Ignalta's lands!How the hell did We not smell their border markers!"

 _ **What's so bad about Ignalta?**_

"If they find Us here, they'll rip Us to shreads or declare war on the pack!"

 _ **And?**_

"Don't you remember all the problems that came up between the packs becuase of their hostility? Sunburst and Malichor always fought at the gatherings!"

 _ **Oh, that was the shit Sunburst was yelling about during the gatherings,I always thought that it was her being a bitch.**_

"Did you even pay attention to the gatherings?" I ask jumping off the branch,landing neatly on the ground.

 _ **Of course I wasn't paying attention I was too busy pointing out every pretty female I saw to Raiden,her reactions were funny.**_

Rolling my eyes at my counterpart juvenile behavior I sniffed the air warrily and slinked across the ground,there were no fresh houndoom scents and that both relieved and made me nervous.

The majority of the houndoom territory was barren with little undergrowth to hide and mingle scents and I winced as I my tail dragged behind me spreading my scent, it was simply too long and heavy to lift in the air.

"We're going to die." I whimper ducking behind a log as I heard a bush rustle.

 _ **Stop being so paranoid! Ignalta isn't even a big problem anymore, it's been three years since the merge and we've never had problems with them,most of our problems these days are Caleo and her bitchiness.**_

"You blame Caleo for everything."

 _ **Not for everything, if it weren't for her bitchiness, I wouldn't exist. I'm grateful for that at least.**_

None of us said a thing as a patrol of houndoom and houndour stepped into the open, despite the apparent wasteland that their territory was; the dark-typed canines had sleek well-groomed fur and thick muscles,their scent while bitter carried the slightly irritating smell of a fire-type.I prayed to whatever gods existed to allow me to pass through the territory undetected,that my own dark-type scent was lost in dogs passed, not even batting an eye at my hiding place as they renewed the border markings in the disgusting way that canines always did-urinating over everything and promptly left.

I waited flat against the ground until I could no longer hear the crunch of the branches and leaves that they trampled underfoot,sighing in relief I picked my way through the territory, my legs feeling too stiff for me to break into a run.I wrinkled my nose at the scent of Ignalta's border marker and did my best to ignore the pungent odor as I passed over the now visible borderline and into my own on instinct I swept my tail over my side of the border and I spat on the ground repulsed by the musty dog odor and rushed upstream back to the multi-scented forest.

Now We were wandering though the woods, sniffing the air in search for failed hunt for earlier today was fresh in my mind and I growled determined to catch something, with so many prey scents I doubted that I wasn't going to catch anything and after picking out one of many I dropped into a crouch and began stalking the prey.

The sentret pushed itself onto it's striped tail,nervously scanning the area before dropping to the ground searching for seeds or worms or whatever sentrets ate.I took a few steps, watching how the normal-type's long ears twitched, it rose onto its tail again and I flattened myself against the ground,hidden by the tall grass.

I crawled forward keeping my gaze on the plump body of the rodent as it whipped around to scan the other direction;my nose caught an odd bitter-sweet scent and I pushed myself to my paws and tackled the distracted gave out a shrill squeak as I pinned it down,struggling with the size and weight of the creature,before dislocating its spine with a swift bite.I gripped my catch and began hauling it into the bushes, feeling self-pride build up in my out that the sentret had mostly been fur indicating that it was going to be a very shaggy furret, due to this minor detail It had taken me forever to spit the hairs out of my teeth.

Once I was done I sniffed the air,and followed the sharp unnatural smell of ozone to its source,pushing a few branches out of the way to look at the large bulky jolteon.

"Raiden, without Ariada?"

 _ **With Ariada**_ Nightmare corrected _**Look closer.**_

I squinted and scanned the forest, but found nothing else than a few ferns and other leaves.

 _ **Ariada's good at hiding.**_

I nodded observing as the jolteon sniffed the air in search of prey, her large nicked ears twitched the fur on them becoming electrified quills just like the rest of her pelt.

Raiden would appreciate the help considering that Ariada only tagged along for the sunlight,exercise,and for Raiden and not for the actual prey.

"Your turn." I whispered to Nightmare, shutting my eyes and allowing my consciousness to fade away into the Mindscape.

* * *

 **Caleo's Pov:**

I groaned, turning around in my nest, opening my eyes slightly to see a blur of sunlight and shadows mixing together before I shut my eyes again, but my ears were now picking up the bothersome sounds of chatter and my vision turned blackish-red as the sunlight fell directly on my face.

I lifted my head, blinking the drowsiness den was empty and I yawned puffing my fur and releasing the excess heat that my body had stored up during the cool night.

Glancing up at the tangle of thorny branches over my head, I wondered what time it was, the woven bramble didn't allow the sky to be seen, so I could only guide myself by the amount of sunshine that slipped through the cracks.

Yawning again I began to stretch, getting rid of even more excess heat as I did, the den felt too warm even for me, fluffing myself up again, I wondered if I had slept tough New-leaf and woken up on some arid Green-leaf with my stretching I got to my paws and quickly made my way to the exit squeezing through the shrinking hole.

The clearing was peaceful, which wasn't a big surprise considering the small size of the 'pack'. The sun was directly above the forest, marking the hour as midday as the trees danced in the soft breeze, and the scent of fresh-kill lingered in the air.

I immediately began walking towards the leafeon, jolteon and sylveon that sat in at the western edge of the clearing eating what I assumed was lunch.

"Good afternoon, I guess?" I said as I sniffed the patch of grass where I was going to sit, it had the bitter scent of a dark-type so the umbreon responsible for it had probably just left.

Raiden made a strange crackling sound at my comment and began to rip her prey apart with more viciousness.

I ignored the jolteon's unfriendly gesture and puffed out my thick fur once more, disturbing Ariada in the skinny leafeon stopped kneading the ground with her tiny brown paws and looked at me annoyed.

"How's everything?" I mumbled, lifting my paw and giving it a few licks as I sat down.

"Everything's fine, as alwa- Raiden, stop playing with it !" Ariada chided starting at the bloody tendon that hung from the jolteon's jaws.

"I'm not playing!"

"Just hurry up and eat it!"

"That's what I'm doing!" The jolteon hissed scarfing down the remains of her rattata.

I glanced at Link,the small sylveon laid on the ground head on his paws, his blue-tipped feelers twitched slightly, the fairy-type opened one blue eye, stared at me, then closed it, making a sound deep in his throat.

I wanted to fluff my fur again and my paws pricked with the need to walk in an endless repetitive cycle.

"Is it just me or is it hot?"

"Today's as cool as a cucumber Caleo, it's probably because you slept all night and half of the day." Raiden mewed washing her yellow flank in an attempt to keep her fur needles flat.

"What's a cucumber?" Link asked, sitting up and raising his dancing feelers to the air.

The jolteon shrugged "Misty always said stuff about cucumbers, she never explained what a cucumber was. I think its a plant." She glanced at Ariada for a confirmation.

"Just because I'm a grass-type, doesn't mean I know every plant in existence." She hissed, violet eyes flashing venomously.

"Maybe, but you know about healing herbs."

"Healing herbs." Ariada repeated "Viridis never mentioned cucumbers."

"What about Slate?" Raiden inquired "He was a domesticated pokemon after all."

Ariada was thoughtful for a moment, her foreleaf dropping to cover the space between her eyes "I never asked, but fro-"

I ignored my packmates and got to my paws, the conversation was foreign to me anyways I knew nothing about herbs or whatever customs had been created by the other pack before the merge.

I walked to a patch of burnt grass which had become in recent years my 'pacing place'. It had become a habit to walk and walk and walk, think a bit about my problems and rid myself of the excess energy.

Eventually I lost track of time, engrossed in my habit, it took various taps on the shoulder to snap out of in.I stopped and looked at Raiden, her fur was slightly spiked up.

"Midnight was in a good mood when she left, perhaps you should go and walk in the forest and meet up with her, all this heat will give Ariada a stroke." I glanced at the small leafeon who was laying on the ground, on her side, not injured or sickened at all.

I bit my lip and growled sending out a wave of heat in annoyance.

"What did I just tell you!?"

"Ariada's fine, stop overreacting."

"So being concerned for the well being of my mate is overreacting?" The smell of ozone became stronger and the crackling sound that Raiden made whenever she exhaled had become mixed with a low snarl. I could faintly hear Ariada shouting at Raiden.

"If I, by any chance bother Ariada , you two can go SOMEWHERE ELSE!"

The jolteon gekkered at me, the white ruff of fur around her neck stood up, and electricity spun and twirled around her body in arches that lasted for mere seconds.I snarled in reply feeling my chest fill up with flames, my thick mane and tail began to glow and flicker, the area of blacked grass around me glared at each other, ears flat against our heads, tails - if Raiden even had a tail- swishing back and forth, jaws wide open displaying our fangs.

It seemed that we had stared at each other for hours, and my paws had begun to prickle,I was getting tired of the 'standing still game'.I was about to raise myself on my hind legs in an attempt to scare Raiden off when a pair of feelers came between us.

My inner flame dimed as the calming fairy-type energy spread throughout the camp and filled the air.

Ariada made her way towards Raiden in quick little steps, I could hear the annoyed tone in her soft voice as she lead the pissed off jolteon away into the forest. Link walked past me his paws barely touching the charred ground around me as he moved in quick,long,graceful steps, his long blue and pink feelers trailing behind him.

I growled once he left, and turned I would go and see if Midnight was around, if not; at least I would get to fight.

* * *

Tracking them down was easy, Midnight tended to avoid the area around the lake and her demon usually lingered in the more isolated parts of the forest.

I fluffed my fur for what seemed the thousandth time, and I pushed aside some grass with my paws and growled as I scented the distinctive bitter odor of a dark-type. As I followed the scent trail though the forest, the trees became bigger and less sunlight peeked through the branches, the chirping pidgeys were replaced by silent hoot-hoots and the soft tall grass became thick and untamable. Eventually the trail came to a stop and I searched among the tree branches knowing that Midnight's bitch of a companion liked climbing.

"Look at that Midnight, a wild bitch."

I jumped startled and turned around coming face-to-face with the dark-type. I snarled igniting my mane and tail.

"Calm down Caleo, I'm just saying the truth, after all, lying is a terrible sin." The demon chuckled softly, red eyes flashing.

"I'm not here to listen to your shit, I'm here because I want to fight."

There wasn't any swearing or snarling as I expected, instead I received an eye-roll. I guessed that they were in a really good mood today.

"Go fight with Raiden, isn't that what you always do?"

"Why aren't you swearing, isn't that what you always do?"

The demon shrugged, "Eh, the day's still young, and besides, Midnight's happy, so I'm happy, we're white eyes for today." the red-eyed umbreon smiled and skipped around me, I blinked confused "There is no reason to worry, I am here to do what you failed to do as a sibling.I'll take care of Midnight, you've already lost."

I bit my lip and growled.

"Maybe I could have had done my job if you hadn't turned Midnight against me, you demon!"

"Some of these problems have been around long before I existed, not when you had your chances to redeem yourself in Our eyes-" The voice sounded echoed as if there were two speakers instead of one,but only for a brief moment ."- I even fucking encouraged Midnight to try to close the gap between you two; and you-" her voice became a vicious snarl "-only made the fucking gap wider."

The umbreon shook her head, and stayed still for a moment ears twitching while I wondered when I had been given this 'other chance'.

The demon then spat onto the ground, and regained her cherry cheerful attitude."If We are needed, We'll be in the woods!" The voice was echoed once more and I watched as they skipped around me, before diving into the bushes.  
I remained staring at the undergrowth where the umbreon had disappeared confused and angry.


	2. Intruders

**Chapter Two: Intruders**

* * *

 **Nightmare's POV:**

By the time We arrived at camp the sun was just due to set in an hour,and it was already painting a pretty mix of silver-orange light and shadows over the trees, branches and landscape.

I wearily walked through the bushes, and stopped to catch my breath.I blamed Midnight for this, her odd sleeping habits weren't doing Us any good, but there wasn't much I could do to solve the problem.

Camp was quite a far cry from the lively environment that I had 'grown' in and while I disliked the general air that the whole camp gave off in this lonely ' Caleo's the only one here' state, there wasn't anything I could do about it besides waiting for Raiden to get the balls to get us out of was something that she always said she would do but that I knew she would never ,like me had grown in this forest as a member of the Relta Pack and even if the pack and everything it stood for fell apart years ago shortly after Slate's death,I knew that the jolteon loved this forest and the good memories it held.

Memories of just being stupid and crossing territorial borders,climbing trees and teasing Raiden with just about every female we saw came to my mind and I were the good days, back when Raiden,Misty,Krystal,Coal and I didn't care about anything that couldn't be summed up as trouble-making,back when everyone was alive and well.

Damn, I was getting old.

Looking at the rather empty camp, I wondered why the fuck I had even bothered to drag myself all the way to this wasteland.I had spent a good portion of the morning hunting with Raiden and Ariada so it seemed rather pointless to return because of them; maybe Link was the reason for my return but he wasn't even in Camp, aside from myself the only other eeveelution was Caleo.

I dragged my back legs on the ground not really wanting to do anything involved with movement, I felt neutral,dull, purposeless per to say,my ears twitched as I became aware of the persistent feeling of nothing to do, it was bothering me, crawling down my spine like some kind of bug and I growled disliking the calm and quite.

Bored out my mind and not wanting to return to the even larger boredom of the Mindscape,I began to use some physic-type energy to lift a nearby tiny stone wobbled as I fumbled to grasp it properly but once I did take a hold of it I lifted it into the air without much effort. I purred glad to see that I could still control my psychic energy without too much risk to my mental quite proud of myself I began lifting pinecones and few clumps of earth,swirling them around in the air for my own entertainment.

A wave of temptation passed over me as I caught sight of the oh-so-mighty Caleo sitting on her burnt tree stump,rusty brown back facing me.I purred and without much of an after thought I hurled the items at the flareon with all my hysteria when a clump of dirt hit her in the back of the fire-type lurched forward and turned to glare at me with flaming blue eyes and my laughter became louder as it became a shared were aware of how Our voice rose and fell merging and splitting, too quickly the shared moment faded as Midnight fully returned to inactivity and I was left alone to deal with the raging ball of fiery fluff.

I gave the flareon a weak apologetic smile before a blast of fire was shot in my direction,with a soft 'eep!' I jumped out of the way narrowly avoiding being turned to ash.I gekkered at her and she snarled puffing up her fur as much as she could,I allowed my fur to stand and my skin to produce venom but then instead of attacking I simply spat on the ground and went to sit near the empty fresh-kill pile.

The sun disappeared over the horizon and my rings flickered before glowing probably wasn't coming back anytime soon same with Raiden and Ariada, sighing I got to my paws and slipped into the bramble den, the whole den was too big and empty for my taste, but there wasn't anything I could do about that.

As much as wanted to curl up in Link's nest,a part of me insisted that maybe it would be more wise to sleep with Caleo again, just incase Midnight took over and panicked over sleeping with male. Slightly annoyed with myself I flopped down onto the flareon's nest, curled up at the very edge and closed my eyes, an series of afterthoughts popped into my head warning me that hell could break lose when the short tempered fire type saw me in her nest, but I quickly dismissed them.I would deal with her bullshit later.

* * *

 _The silver clouds of the cold and usually empty Mindscape were the only thing that I saw._

 _Unlike my counterpart who was convinced that this hell hole was better than the forest; I minded, dreaming like a normal pokemon was a rare occurrence for Us, and when it happened I was grateful. To Midnight the Mindscape was comforting place that was only accessible to Us and to her bewilderment Link. A place where We could and would always protect each was a sappy and stupid fantasy in her eyes,a twisted paradise, but there was nothing I could do about it._

 _I yawned looking around in hopes of seeing my alter-ego, but she surprisingly wasn't in my field of another glance at the eternal mass of silver and black mist and I began to walk aimlessly._

 _I had no idea of where I was mist all looked the same to walk turned into a speed walk as I passed under a spot where the gravity incressed.I trudged out of the gravitacional pocket, and sent a silent thanks to Palkia or Giratina or whoever was the designated deity of gravity for not crippling me._

 _Walking,walking,walking...There was nothing more than walking, there was no noise, no sun, no moon,no sky,nobody else than me at the moment._

 _It was pure loneliness._

 _My ears twitched nervously as I stopped to look silence was unnerving,my eyes scanned the clouds, searching for some deformity or any oddity that hinted at a hidden enemy._

 _There was nothing but I refused to let my guard down,I had learned the hard way that not following my gut instinct usually led to horrible, horrible things._

 _Another paranoia-driven glance and a flash of my rings did little to calm me and I half imagined some demon jumping out of the dark and screaming in my face._

 _I shook my head and gritted my teeth, I was a dark-type I was supposed to cause fear, not to be a victim of it!I was the one who with a mere bite to the neck caused death swiftly, the one who gave out heart-attacks with just the glow of her rings, I was the creature that ate rotting corpses and spat venom!_

 _Yet the fear still persisted, it still crawled down my spine,and settled in my guts making my flight instincts scream._

 _Swallowing the rocks that had formed in my throat I opened my jaws slightly to take in the life-less cold air of the nothing out the ordinary but my fear persisted, growing more and more as I glanced around once I created some dark energy in my mouth, keeping my muzzle slightly parted so that I could quickly shoot the ball of negativity._

Click,click,click.

 _The sudden clicking sound made me jump and I spun around pushing my ball of dark-energy out of my jaws and into the clouds in a wide arc._

 _The clicking sound persisted seemingly coming from all directions.I trembled unable to stop the fear from rising to the surface,my heart pulsed wildly as my gaze bolted from one spot to another._

 _The clicking became louder and more disorienting coming from the left,from the right, behind me, in front of me...everywhere, everywhere,EVERYWHERE!I spun around in tune to the clicking trying to determine when and where to attack,but it was fruitless._

 _I felt my body freeze up against my will and panic flooded my mind, my legs became numb and heavy and all struggles to escape the physic's grasp became null as physic energy invaded my mind and shut off the connections between my brain and my body.I could do nothing more than be trapped in silent panic, my sides heaved as the physic user broke deeper into my mind, ripping the thick dark-type barrier that kept my memories,emotions and thoughts did that action with so much ease that I immediately knew that it was a very experienced physic._

I find myself with a pair of bright yellow eyes that belong to a blue-ringed umbre-...Sitting in cave laughing alongside Misty,Krystal and Coal after pointing out that Raid-….Link and I sitting in a meadow admiri-.….forcing Midnight back into the Mindscape….Watching an eclip-…..an argument with Midnight…...hunting with the other umbr-…Link..…wanderi-...'Can't you s-'...Slate...'My name's Midnight'...gat-...Equinox and singing...'Good catch Coal!'...'friends,everybody's Our friend!'...Misty,Krystal and I digging out Raiden's grave when we thought she died….Coal learning physic…...….Misty coming home blo-Being pinned down at the edge of the lak-

 _The last memory caused something in to snap me ,I growled and summoned enough rage-fueled dark-energy to serve the connection between me and the physic head hurts at the sudden disconnection and my limbs give way underneath me.I open my eyes wearily and tried to get up,struggling thanks to the trembling and pain that wracked my body with every movement. l focussed on the feeling of rage that was now bubbling inside me,the indignation,the memories were mine and mine alone and NOBODY had to go around forcefully reading them._

 _"I know your there!" I snap, my fur stood on end tipped with venom, as I slowly rescanned the area._

 _My ears twitch as I hear the nearby clicking and I shoot a ball of dark-energy with a rather surprising shadow ball flies through the air, neatly cutting the clouds and smashing into the side of my rather-slow enemy with a sickening wet crunch.I winced and peered into the hole expecting to see the mind-reading creature rise to its paws, but instead I saw nobody._

* * *

 **Ariada's Pov:**

I stood at the edge of the den's entrance-exit staring up cloudy night sky;the clouds clearly hinted that there would be a change in weather- probably a subtle one considering the current season.

With Green-leaf nearly upon us,I found myself becoming more and more worried, the season of the sun tended to be blistering hot and very dry,with the only source of water being the lake and the rivers that fed it.

Glancing up at the clouds once more I shook my head, who knew?

Maybe this Greenleaf wouldn't be as bad as last year's.

Stepping outside, I breathed the slightly colder air, feeling the small amounts of carbon dioxide get absorbed by my leaves,ready to become oxygen and energy once daylight broke.

I looked around and stumbled through the shadow filled clearing,squinting as I tried to make out the small shape that was in fount of me,with an irritated sigh I gave up on sight and extended one paw to touch the hazy form.I felt the stiff rough surface of tree bark and passed my tiny claws over it, feeling how some of the drier looser wood scales,chipped off and fell to the grass with soft almost inaudible rustles.

I swished my tail around and climbed onto the up at these hours was rare for me but tonight I just simply couldn't sleep,it wasn't because of Raiden and her spiky fur, or because of Caleo and the heat waves she occasionally created, it was just simply that I didn't feel sleepy.

I considered going on a walk, but instinct advised me not to go,while the forest was relatively predator free and my speed and powerful draining attacks were a good defense,my blindness could lead to falling into a river or the lake like some idiot, and I didn't want to end up drowning like Nymphia.

So I stayed on my stump, ripping of the wood scales and humming a little tune that my mother had taught me so many moons ago.

It was boring, this camp should have had been filled with life even at this hour, umbreons coming back from hunting and a few leafeons helping others deal with insomnia or some nightly aliment, and then there were the times that something happened over at the lake…...

All the blood that was seeping into the mud and spilling into the lake, the various eeveelutions some dead, some dying,some barely clutching onto life.I shook my head and cleared the images away.

In a way that was a con of being a leafeon, constantly being asked to heal wounds,having the life of the other eeveelutions in their paws, seeing death over and over because not everyone could be saved... but then again everybody had to deal with death eventually,it was a natural and live, you die, and maybe get remembered for generations if you did something important, or stupid or both.

It's how things were,are and would be.

I hung my front paws off the edge of the stump and continued to chip away at the wood scales,I liked the sound of the wood separating from each other and the feeling of taking something apart with my tiny nearly useless claws, my long tail hung off the other side of the stump slowly swishing back and forth.

My ears twitched as I heard pawsteps behind me,and the air filled with the faint scent of ozone.

"What are you doing at such an hour?"

"I'd like to ask you the same question."

"I noticed that you were gone."

"Yeah, right." I scoffed "You sleep like a rock Raiden."

The jolteon moved, grass swishing around her paws as she did so.I watched out of the corner of my eye as she sat down besides my stump.

"Seriously why are you awake?" Raiden asked "You usually don't stir until morning."

I simply shrugged and sat up, lifting one paw to nibble a leaf that was growing between my toes.

The jolteon huffed,and twitched her ears as the crackling sound of her breathing broke the silence.

I began to lick a few misplaced leaves into place,and enjoyed the silence of the night,this was rarely seen back when I lived in Relta.A noctowl cried as it swooped down to catch its with grooming, I curled my tail around my legs and remained completely still on the stump.

"Why are you awake?" Raiden asked me again.

"Just because."

"Just because?" I met Raiden's skeptical sideway glance.

I nodded and tried to dig my claws into bark,feeling annoyed when they didn't sink into the wood, the fur on my shoulder bristled slightly at the jolteon's gaze,my ears flattened slightly in annoyance while the tip of my tail twitched.

I loved Raiden to no end but sometimes she could be too clingy, I understood her reasoning after all her 'best friend' Midnight was rarely around or in a good mood, Krystal and Misty left the pack along with various others,and Coal was dead.

But her over protectiveness bothered me, she knew well enough how fierce and resistant leafeons could be, yet she kept on treating me like some delicate daisy.

I blamed Nymphia and her stupidity.

"So…are you ready for the Equinox?"

I shrugged, the Equinox while important seemed pointless with a pack of four.

"Still bitter over the fact that our pack is small and that there are no other leafeons?"

"Pretty much." I muttered "I miss the crowds, the activity,sunbathing with Emeril,Nymphia,Ginger,and the others…"

"Don't worry, I'm sure that the Green-leaf Equinox will have a few kits."

"You've been saying that ever since Midnight and Link started talking to each other,and they don't even sleep in the same nest anymore."

"Come on, Ari ; why can't you see the love between them?"

"I can't see anything right now."

"Let me fix that." the jolteon laughed,there was a distinct crackling sound as her fur rose and turned into electric quills, the smell of ozone increased and I shut my eyes as electricity rippled through her fur,Illuminating the area with a pulsing purplish-white light.

I blinked a few eyes,my eyes were hurting from the rapid change between light and dark, and the smell of ozone ; which always reminded of the sweet clean scent that the earth gave off after a thunderstorm was becoming unbearable; no longer pleasant.

My throat and lungs began to burn as I breathed the ozone filled air,and I jumped clumsy off the of the tree's remains as my already bad vision distorted, quickly speckling with black as I wobbled away from the jolteon.

The sound of electricity stopped and and I was vaguely aware of Raiden rushing to my side.I trudged forward away from her on legs that felt bloated and more useless than a vaporeon on land.

"Ariada, you feeling alright?" Raiden fussed walking next to me.

I would have spat that I was on the verge of collapse but a simple 'Neh,'was all I could muster.

"I'm so sorry! I forgot that you can't breath too much ozone!" The crackling sound returned and my legs collapsed due to the sudden increase in ozone.I madly scrambled in the dark trying to access the clean air above.

I faintly heard a squeak, that I assumed came form Raiden and the ozone lessened, in fact the jolteon's presence vanished, and I breathed in the clearing air greedily.

Once the numbness faded from my body I winced realizing with a pang of annoyance that Raiden was going to be more protective of me.

Wonderful.

Thanks to the sweet scent of the grass and earth returned the tightness of my throat subdued and I purred content.

"Sorry about that." Raiden said sheepishly

"Don't fret about it,-" I coughed and the jolteon bolted to my side worried.

"I'm fine,I'm fine!" I cried getting to my paws as the crackling filled the air again, my mate remained skeptical,pelt slightly spiked up and ears flat.

"See?" I mewed doing a small spin. "It's my fault anyways for being a friggin idiot."

"Language."Raiden growled lightheartedly "It's _fucking_ idiot not, _friggin."_

"Swearing is a terrible sin."

"Then stop implying it."

"I'll stop 'implying swearing' once you stop swearing, that way we'll both be clean."

"I'll die swearing then."

I chuckled at her words and licked my paw frowning at how the leaf between my toes had become limp, I knew that my ears,foreleaf and tail where going to completely ruined!

In fact; I couldn't even feel them!

I growled slightly and yawned,glancing quickly at the remained cloudy and useless for time-telling.

"Tired?"

I nodded and allowed Raiden to lead the way back to the we were curled up soundly in our nest, I made a mental note to go out before the sun rose, Raiden wasn't going to leave me alone otherwise.

* * *

I had actually managed to complete my task of leaving camp before the sunrise and now I stood dumbfounded as twilight filled the air.I tried to make out the shapes of the forest from the silvery orange glow that seemed to illuminate and overshadow everything.

"Crap."

I sighed and decided to wait for my eyes to adjust to the slowly growing clarity,my ears twitched sensing the light and immediately began the process of photosynthesis, whatever exhaustion I had faded away as I was filled with energy.I sunbathed between a tiny pair of sapling trees until the sun had risen over the mountains that loomed over our territory.

Yawning I proceeded to get up from my resting place,I stretched,groomed my slightly ruffled cream coat and made my way to….somewhere…

In the end the area I had gotten myself into wasn't the kind of area that I didn't like, it was an area with small trees with too much space between them, grass that had been trampled and trimmed down so much that it was dry and thin.

Raiden wasn't going to find me!

The trimmed down state of the area bothered me,it was easy to tell from the color of the grass and silence of the area that this damage was fairly recent.I caught sight of an odd track and I neared it cautiously sniffing it despite the fact that I had no sense of smell at the moment.

There were two long trails,composed of a series of raised bumpy lines sandwiched between flattened earth, the thing that had caused the print was heavy and had moved recklessly through the forest plowing through the undergrowth without a had passed in this area with their vans and cars.

I canted my head to the left confused by the human's sudden presence, they had already come earlier this year, they had checked our population, the state of the forest and left after two weeks without causing much disruption to the forest life.

It was odd….my eyes followed the trail and some time later I found myself walking alongside the tire tracks, Raiden was probably already searching for me and so I needed to keep moving, if the humans tried to catch me, I could fight just fine.

My fur prickled and I glanced up at the trees, seeing no pidgeys or spearows above my head, the ground had been undisturbed since the car or van had rushed though and everything was filled with an unnatural silence.

My nerves buzzed as I followed the trail farther and farther away from camp, my ears twitched as I heard something move among the undergrowth,I glanced over my shoulder as I heard light paw steps.

The undergrowth rustled again, and I froze seeing a flash of black and white between the leaves.

"Why are you following the tire tracks?"

I yelped in surprise and scrambled hastily to face the chuckling sylveon that was standing behind me.

"Don't do that! You nearly gave me a frigging heart-attack!"

A feeler immediately covered my mouth "shhh...Swearing is a terrible sin."

I tried to speak though the furry ribbon but the only thing that could be heard was 'Mmmph!'.Link lifted his other feelers and looked around cautiously, his long rabbit-like ears twitched as he sensed something.

"Let's go." He whispered guiding me back in the direction that I came from.I growled and another feeler pushed me forward.

"Shhh…." He mewed looking concerned as he placed a feeler over his mouth "We have to leave."

I flattened my ears and allowed myself to be escorted back to where I had first seen the tire trail.

"What were you doing there?!" Link asked me waving his feelers frantically "Those were tire tracks!"

"I know," I growled annoyed.

"Wh-what are you even doing so far from camp? Raiden was frantic when she saw you were gone!"

"I wanted to go on my own!" I snapped "I don't need Raiden to constantly care for me, I'm sick of it!" My foreleaf quivered and toppled swinging uselessly in front of my face. "I can defend myself, I'm not some friggin daisy."

"I wouldn't blame Raiden for being a tad over-protective considering the amount of graves in this forest."

I winced at Link's comment, but still didn't allow the bitterness to leave my voice.

"I guess, she has a point, but I still don't like a leafeon doesn't make me weak."

"Suit yourself,-"Link mewed licking his small pink paw "-right now I would feel a lot more comfortable if I knew my mate was safe."

I rolled my eyes and blew my foreleaf out of my sylveon looked back at where we had come from and I followed his gaze.

"What was in there?" I asked

"I'm not sure….but I felt a very bad vibe."

"A dark-type?"

"No, it's aura didn't carry such negativity."

"So?"

"It's not the pokemon itself that worries me, its what was up ahead…."

Link shook his head as if to clear it "We should tell the others about this."

"And then what? Caleo won't care and shrug it off,Midnight will most likely not be at camp and Raiden won't let me leave her sight."

Link bit his lip and his feelers floated reflecting his uncertainty "Let's get back to camp before Raiden mauls Caleo or vice-versa."

I nodded and reluctantly followed the dainty fairy-type back to camp.


	3. The Equinox

**Chapter Three: The Equinox**

* * *

 **Raiden's Pov:**

The clouds drifted lazily in the lavender and pink sky,early sunshine slipped through the holes in the forest canopy and dappled the floor with light and shadows, the forest with its sounds and scents had almost fully fledged into Greenleaf; a time of warmth and abundance.

Sitting across the meadow from Midnight and I; were our mates, and my fur spiked up at the leafeon's tone, while it wasn't exactly menacing it still carried a steely edge. Midnight noticed it as well, growling softly as Ariada exchanged a few words with Link while we watched silently from afar.

"Sage, clover, rosemary, and this is.. " Ariada pointed at a pile of herbs, the sylveon took the stems,leaves and white flowers in his feelers and gently sniffed the plant matter, blue eyes narrowed while his extra feelers flicked around him, showing his uncertainty in regards to the plant's identificacion.

"Daisy?" I could hear his voice quivering.

"Oh shit,"Midnight murmured,I turned to see her shaking her head at her mate's answer, a twinkle of amusement in her red eyes.

The leafeon hissed and flattened her long ears."This is chamomile!" she snapped,her long tail lashing back and forth.

"He's fucked." Midnight whispered to me.

"Pretty much, wonder how Ari will threaten him."

"I'll bet that she'll threaten to shove the chamomile up his a-"She stopped herself and chuckled at the sight of the male sylveon bounding towards us,ever so gracefully despite his terrified and panicked expression.

Ariada being a leafeon and by proxy one of the fastest eeveelutions easily caught up to the comparability slow fairy-type and tackled him to the ground with a surprising amount of force.

"Oh f...sh,-"Midnight growled not finding a word to describe the situacion as she pushed herself to her paws and walked towards the scuffling eeveelutions.

I sighed,stretched and quickly walked after the separated the quarreling duo with her physic energy, and huffed dropping them on the ground with little-to-no concern if they landed face-first.

"And they say umbreons are violent and irracional."

I sighed,"Seriously Ariada?"

The leafeon narrowed her violet eyes "Sorry, it just annoys me that this idiot-" she pointed at Link with her dainty brown paw "-Can't tell cheromile apart from a daisy!"

"Ari, I can't tell them apart both look like the same fucking thing."

"Besides," Midnight added with a teasing tone "You used to confuse yew berries with juniper berries,it's a miracle you didn't kill someone!" her lip curled up as she gave Ariada a smile.

"B-b-" The slim leafeon gritted her teeth, flattening her ears in either denial or embarrassment if not a mix of both. "frig,"

"Fuck." I corrected.

The leafeon groaned "But yelling was how Emeril told us to fix our mistakes."

"That's one messed up learning environment." Link noted. "How did you even stand that kind of treatment?"

Ariada flattened her ears and ignored the question.

"Didn't Viridis teach you all of you leafeons healing, why would you need Emeril?"

"There were somethings that he didn't know and Emeril,coming from a human city knew."

"Like what?" Link asked his voice cold and steely as he narrowed his bright blue eyes.

"Proper cultivation of rarer types of plants and alternative solutions to green,white and red cough in case there wasn't any nepeta."

"Still doesn't excuse you from yelling and threatening Link."Midnight said dully.

"I said I was sorry!"

The umbreon muttered something under her breath and smacked Link with her long bushy tail, the sylveon gekkered softly but finally sat up straight, Midnight leaned over and whispered something in his ears and he pushed his mate's face away with his feelers while she chuckled softly.

"When are the kits coming?" I asked with a teasing tone while changing the subject.

The happy pair stared at me with wide eyes and Link's feelers curled up at the tips before Midnight's red eyes lit up and she replied with a laugh as she gently shoved Link "Soon in Leaf-bare or in New-leaf, we'll have so many kits that you'll hate us!"

"And how many would that be?" Ariada asked.

"Umm…how about ten?"

"Holly Frig, isn't that too mu-"

"Shit!-" I interrupted "-kits mewling day in; day out, Caleo's gonna kill both of you."

"And your fucking point is?"

"And there we go again…" Link sighed his long ears drooping. "Please tell me that our kits aren't going to speak like that."

Midnight opened her mouth but quickly closed it her ears twitching every now and then as she stifled a laugh.

"What a sin-filled generation." Ariada groaned dramatically, her black-speckled foreleaf climbing towards the sun as she stretched.

"Stop being dramatic Ari."

"Swearing is a terrible sin."

I rolled my eyes "So is implying swearing."

"It's not swe-"

"Why does it feel like we have this conversation almost everyday?" Midnight groaned flattening her short ears and burying her head in her large paws.

"There isn't much to talk about."

The umbreon's head shot upwards and all of the sudden she was on her paws,wagging her long tail. "We should go to one of those human 'daycares' and k-free some of the eeveelutions that are up for sale!"

My ears twitched, it certainly wasn't the first time the stunt had been mentioned,but sadly it was something I doubted we would ever do, the nearest human settlements-farms as Slate had told us they were called-were miles away, randomly placed among fields filled with fluffy mareep, miltanks,taurus and annoying dogs, the human city itself was moderate-sized speck in the distance way past the farmlands,all in all a half-moon's worth of traveling,if not more.

"Maybe some other time, the Equinox is tonight and we desperately need that blessing and besides Ari doesn't have any traveling mixes."

The umbreon's ears dropped and her tail stopped creating dust clouds as it stilled."That's what we always say," she growled "We'll plan this, we'll plan that, but do we ever do anything we say?!"

"Look I promise we'll go to the city but it really requires time."

Midnight plopped onto the ground with a scowl.

"Why don't we visit Viridis?" Ariada suggested,shaking her head to move her now crumpled leaf out of her face. "That'll be doing something different won't it?

"I don't know about you, but I'm going." I said lazily getting up and surprising myself by realizing that I had never noticed that I had been lying down in the first place.

I heard the paw-steps and the swishing grass behind me indicating that my packmates were following,slightly raising my spikes I lead the way towards the dreaded 'Crimson lake'.

In better times it was known as 'Lake Pacis' with 'pacis' being some-kind of special word in the old language that was spoken back in the days when there were four packs instead of before Slate came to Relta and even more before Ryewhisker and Cloudberry's famously infamous affair.

Unfortunately in recent years the area around the lake had been the place of various murders and violent attacks, mostly in Reltian territory and so it had been renamed Crimson lake.I had always found it odd that the attacks had begun with a wounded vaporeon and ended with dead vaporeon.

We carefully made our way around the edge of the lake,avoiding treading on the sticky mud, I turned my head slightly to look back, Ariada's ears twitched uncomfortably and Midnight was just staring blankly while Link kept one feeler wound around her leg and another one loosely around her neck,steering her every so often.

Aside from Midnight's occasional incoherent mumbling, the trip though the lake shore was a long and suffocating quiet, nobody laughed or said a word, even the birds had stopped chirping so by the time we arrived at the base of Viridi's mountain I was relieved.

"You came up here every half-moon Ari,-" I said admiring the rising slope,"-lead the way."

Looking slightly tense the leafeon nodded and began to lead us up the mountain path.

* * *

Slowly the terrain changed,the forest and plants melted away somewhere above the mountain base, and the path became basically non-existent forcing us to scramble over a mix of rock and dirt, plant life had reduced itself to a few unhealthy looking herbs and gnarled became difficult to find a paw hold,and occasionally when my large paws slipped I would send a cascade of loose rocks down at Link and Midnight.

I looked up at the leafeon that lead the way, watching as her long crinkled tail swished back and forth as she took the mountain with ease swiftly moving from rock to rock,somehow managing to grasp the stone at the right places with her tiny dull claws.

She stopped once she was atop a large bolder and looked down at us, violet eyes twinkling.

"We're almost there!" She mewed wagging her tail,"We just have to follow this path to Viridis cave."

With difficulty I clambered onto the boulder,gasping for breath, even if Jolteon were made for strenuous activities such as running long distances and climbing great rocks,I felt tired, my legs aching and feeling like liquid.

"Fuuuuuck," I groaned,"I need to exercise more often."

My mate thrilled in response,jogging in place as she waited for Midnight and Link to catch up,seemingly more energetic than when we first had started climbing.

I always awed me how such a delicate-looking species could be so resistant, but that was how leafeon were, fast, and surprisingly good at fighting and other activities, if they weren't disgusted by meat and blood they would easily rival, umbreons,espeons and sylveons in terms of hunting abilities.

However the grass typing gave them a lot of weakness some type-based others coming from nature.

No matter the form fire and ice was terrible for a leafeon,ozone caused wilting and black spots, too much water caused inner rotting and too little cause dehydration, and poison….poison was just lead to a horrible slow death in which one felt burning pain in their veins as their intestines and organs turned into black mush all while the brain jerked and sent maddening signals to the dying nerves.

"Hurry, the frig up!" Ariada snapped, her voice bouncing of the rocky surfaces. "It's already sun-high!"

"Coming!" Link called back, I peered over the edge of the boulder to see the dainty sylveon moving sluggishly due to exhaustion,his feelers dragged behind him,Midnight on the other paw,looked slightly less worn but her thick pelt was still drenched in venom and her steps had a slight wobble to them.

While we waited on the rock, I recovered feeling in my legs and Ariada basked in the sunlight.I scanned the landscape for a trail and my eyes only found one, a rising twisting path at the edge of the cliffside that lead to a rickety looking ledge.I gulped noting for the first time how high we were,from the bolder I could see the forest; a sea of rustling green that swiftly transformed into vast green fields,spotted with livestock and farms, beyond that I could make out the tall towering 'skyscrapers' of the city.

"The view never fails to impress me." Midnight mewed and I jumped, raising my quills, startled by the dark-type's presence, I hadn't noticed when the umbreon and sylveon had caught up to us. Link 's sides were heaving as he also stared at the silhouetted city, his face however was serious, he didn't share Midnight's amazed gaze.

"You would be left speechless if you saw it at night." Ariada said pointing her brown paw at the city, "The fields are filled with glowing mareep,flaaffy and ampharos but the city shines as if it were made of starlight,it even blends in with the skyline itself."

"I can't believe that Slate said that that city fell into ruins, it looks as if never was destroyed." I said attempting to imagine a brown smudge instead of the tall towering structures The city of the demons' as Slate called it in his stories, the place where humanity messed with the forces of life and death to create a terrifying offspring that still roamed the earth to this day.

We stayed gazing at the silhouetted city, maybe someday we would visit The City of the Demons and search for any evidence that it had once fallen into ruin and despair, until then its history would be a mere legend.

"Let's continue, maybe we can see the city at sunset." Ariada said gracefully jumping down from the bolder and starting to lead us through the twisting narrow trail.

The ledge at first had seemed close but now as I carefully moved on the narrow path I realized that my perception of things was wrong, the trail sloped upwards becoming more and more difficult to traverse, a few rocks fell off the edge as I moved my paw too much to the right,I didn't dare look down feeling that if I did I would fall down as well, sharing the same fate as the pebbles.

Ariada stopped suddenly and I nearly walked right into her, the leafeon hissed and I peered over her shoulder, my stomach lurched as I stared; the rocky trail just cut off, leaving a large gaping crumbly edged hole, that was too wide to jump over.

"What now?" Midnight asked.

"Well, I don't know," Ariada admitted with a shrug "This wasn't here, when I used to come."

"Maybe, I can carry you across." Link suggested.I considered the sylveon's idea,but the rather horrifying failed scenario of Ariada, Midnight or myself getting accidently dropped to our deaths flashed in my mind,and I shuddered pressing myself against a rock wall.

"I don't think it's a good idea." I mewed feeling sick to my stomach

"Then what else do you suggest we do to get across, I don't think I can use psychic to lift anything bigger than…" Midnight trailed off,biting her lip in thought.I felt something press around me, similar to a breeze or the wind except that this time it also felt solid,I looked at my paws and flattened my ears in alarm as I saw the red colored energy around them.

"Don't you dare…"I growled at the dark-type.

I was slowly lifted in the air, a few harmless inches at first but all too quickly I was being held above Ariada's head,the physic grasp wasn't tight and I found myself kicking and thrashing.

"Put me down Midnight, please put me down!"

I was carried closer and closer to the gap,until I was floating above it,my fur turned into sharp electric quills as I stared down into the dark void.

"Putmedown,Putmedown,PUTMEDOWNPUTMEONTHEFUCKINGGROUND!"

The physic grasp weakened considerably and I went still,the drop becoming closer,as I wobbled in mid-air,the umbreon's physic hold on me then became suffocating and I was thrown onto solid earth.

I rolled a few feet and got up groggily feeling slightly dazed.I jumped back once I realized how close I was to the edge and sucked in my breath, feeling my blood freeze over and my stomach fill with rocks at the idea that I could have had rolled to my death,I imagined myself just falling into the abyss thanks to Midnight's terrible physic abilities.

I looked back at my packmates,Ariada and Link looked at me with wide horrified faces, while Midnight leaned against the rocky wall.

I growled and turned away from my packmates,stopping to lick a few quills that were still standing and looked at the rocky path stretched a bit further,I could make out the end- a small grassy area, I squinted and made out the entrance to a cave.

I turned to face my brethren "I'll see if Viridis can help you get across!" I called, the eeveelutions nodded and I began to speed-walk towards the cavern.

I sniffed the entrance, feeling slight paranoia, there was a strong bitter-sweet herbal smell that mixed with a musky but spicy odor reminiscent of a fire-type and the idea that Viridis no longer lived in the cave entered my head, but quickly vanished as I entered the cavern.

"Viridis?" I called, looking around,the den was contrary to what I had believed it looked like, while the entrance was dark,narrow and filled with shadows, it quickly widened and lead to a large clearing, the rocky roof above had a large unnatural hole that permitted the sunlight to enter,nests where scattered here and there, some occupied by sick and injured pokemon, a large tree trunk was placed next to a wall, covered in various different herbs and berries.

"He's not here jolteon" A tiny voice squeaked,I followed the voice until my eyes rested on a young growlithe"He's out collecting comfrey root or something like that, he's been gone for the last two hours."

I looked at the dog again and felt a tinge of puppy was barely pass the weaning age and already his front leg was swatted tightly in spinarak silk and I wondered what had happened to the kid's parents.

I turned to leave when the puppy barked- no more like coughed something to me.

"Be careful,somebody has placed leg traps in the woods."

I nodded in acknowledgement and sprinted outside towards my packmates.

"Is Viridis there?" Ariada called,standing at the edge of her side of the gap.

I swallowed seeing how the grass-type balanced herself and shook my head, "No, but there's a growlithe whose waiting for him."

The leafeon frowned,her long black speckled leaves drooping.

"So…..what now? Midnight barely got you across the gap and Link's feelers are too short."

"I could stretch my feelers you know."

"And drop Raiden cause she's too heavy? I don't know about you Link, but I want to see my mate in one piece."

I shut my eyes and the unpleasant image flashed before my eyes.

"I'm going to go see if there's another way back."

"Good luck." Ariada called as I hiked back towards Viridi's clearing.

"Don't fall off a cliff!"

* * *

Up I went, higher up the mountain, and into the forest that had grown because of Viridis presence,it was calm here, the air filled with the soft singing of cherims, while the pink flower pokemon were admittedly adorable I knew what their song really was.

A warning.

A reminder that they were watching, and that any infracion to Viridi's rules would lead to dire consequences.

Pinecos watched silently from the trunks of trees that weren't pines, their beady eyes staring into my soul and I twitched my ears uncomfortable with the high guards of the grass-types.

 _For the last two hours…_

I swallowed and looked up at the cherims somehow their smiles didn't seem so innocent and their beautiful singing sounded more like the song sung at a funeral.

My fears were confirmed when I caught the scent of blood, running forward I found myself staring at a dead bird firmly clutched by the hard metal jaws of a trap,in spite of the rubber padding meant to prevent injury the corpse was bloody.

"What happened here?"

"A swablu was killed ." A cherrim chirped.

"And what happened to the killer?"

The cherrim shrugged. "The killer is a human, we told Virirdis not to go after the human but he ignored us."

I took a step back from the corpse and stared at the cherrim, watching as she continued singing her funeral song,lifting her tiny pink arms to praise the sun.

It was said that maganiums where docile creatures,bringing plants back to life and nursing the sick and injured just like nearly every other grass-type, but living with leafeons had taught me that grass-types could be worse than dark and physic types if they wanted to, they could be vicious,violent, murderous .

I wandered through the woods,unable to lower my quills out of sheer paranoia,the eyes of the grass-types seemed to follow me wherever I went and occasionally someone would chirp and remind me of the rules and point out that I was a predator, 'innocently' speculating on what happened to the rule breakers.

I gritted my teeth hearing the rising and falling high-pitched voices, they seemed to be everywhere,in every tree always watching and singing.

"SHUT THE FUCK UP!" I snapped at the dancing flower pokemon allowing my electricity to flow to the tips of my fur, the cherrims looked down at me with judging eyes.

"I wonder what the punishment for attacking someo-" A electrified spike impaled the bark beside the cherrim's head and they scattered leaping from branch to branch and out of my sight;presumably searching for Viridis.

I continued my walk through the forest, unable to find an alternative route to get over or around the gap, I counted my steps, I wasn't sure how fast meganium were but given their large size and lumbering walk I found no reason to bolt into the undergrowth.

Muttering a series of curses I became aware of how silent the forest had become, a few mushroom pokemon peeked out from the bushes, swelling to release a defensive cloud of poisoned,drugged or paralyzing spores as I passed.I walked through the cloud indifferently knowing from experience that spores were unavoidable, if you didn't breath it in it would get stuck in your fur and skin,and intoxicate you from there.

I shook myself once I was out of the mushroom pokemon's range, creating a small sporestorm.I flattened my ears displeased at how some of the glittering dust was still stuck to my skin,shaking myself again did not work and I growled hoping that the poisoned and drugged spores didn't begin to seriously affect me until later.

Around an hour of two later, I was still searching for an easy way over the gap.I had determined that there was no way to get around the gap that didn't involve climbing higher, something that I didn't want to do.I wondered if my brethren was still waiting for me or if they had left to look for a route of their own; seeing as I took to long to get back to them.

I stopped, gagging as my stomach churned with nausea, unable to vomit anything I forced myself to swallow the mix of saliva and vile that had formed in my mouth only for the semi-digested contents of my stomach to spill onto the forest floor a few seconds later,I groaned as my legs buckled from exhaustion.

F _uuuuck._

* * *

I didn't know how long I had spent knocked out in the grass but once I regained consciousness I scrambled to my paws, swaying slightly on my legs.I glanced at my surroundings glad to see that it was still light although judging by the sun's position it was due to set in an hour.

Fuck….this whole little adventure could mess with the Equinox if I didn't get back to my packmates soon.

Stretching I rose my fur enjoying the feeling of how the electricity flowed from somewhere near my lungs to the roots of each individual fur sensation was oddly calming and I purred listening how the rumbling was mixed with the crackling of electric-energy, shaking my head I looked up at what I had to climb.

The mountain peak.

Feeling that my energy was renewed, I began to climb.

This time around I wasn't wracked by constant fear and nervosism, despite being uphill the ground beneath my paws was solid, hardened by generations of travelers.I could still see the world below me, not the world directly below but rather the surrounding world below, the fields and the city and the smaller mountains that loomed behind the human city.

There was no twisting narrow path,hell; there wasn't a path just an endless expanse of greenery that I was somehow navigating through, ducking,weaving in, weaving out and between.I growled,as my fur got snagged in another thorn bush, I couldn't comprehend why my short pelt kept getting stuck, while Midnight's thick pelt never got snagged when she left camp by the backside.

It didn't make any fucking sense.

Freeing myself from the clutches of the thorn bush I paused; seeing how I had nearly stepped on a half-hidden leg trap with slight terror I continued with my treak, my movements more patient as the sun slowly sank in the sky and I wondered whether the mountain was either very tall or I was just a slow walker.

Probably both.

Eventually after what seemed forever I began to descend, slight pings of fear returned as I felt gravity pull me down and I had the constant thought that one wrong step would send me rolling downhill and off to my death.

It was an odd change of scenery, evidence that maganiums did have some kind of mystical ability.

The ground here was loose and dry, slipping between my paws, now I could no longer focus on the beautiful view of the land beyond the territories, I could only focus on not falling to my demise.

The moon was slowly creeping out the horizon and into the darkened sky by the time I saw my brethren, they were sitting on the ledge chatting among themselves.

Link was the first to notice me, his feelers shot up and he turned to look up at me, his light blue eyes bright.

"Raiden!" He called waving his feelers. "Raiden!"

I broke into a run, too happy at finding my packmates to remember how loose and unstable the ground was.I lost my footing and skidded down in a cloud of dust, I was stopped by both feelers and physic energy and I breathed out shakily, realizing that I was at the edge of the cliff.

"Stupid gravity." I muttered as I gathered my bearings and backed away from the edge.

"How was your trip?" Ariada asked sniffing my fur, she immediately recoiled at the soft scent of poison that still clung to my fur.

"It went fucking great,I attacked one of those stupid cherims,got poisoned and drugged and climbed a hill just to get here."

"Sounds like a good trip." Midnight said sarcastically.

I grunted in response and peered down the dark path that led back to the mountain's base and began to send electric energy to my pelt, soon the area was illuminated by crackling purple-white arcs of energy.I looked over my shoulder at my packmates,Link had loosely wrapped a feeler around Ariada's neck while Midnight moved up to the front besides me,rings glowing in the pale light of the half moon.

"Let's go back to our territory, we still have an Equinox blessing to receive."

* * *

 **Link's POV:**

We now sat gathered in the same clearing from where we had started our journey up the mountain.

The moon was almost at its highest point and the stars of silverpelt twinkled brightly in the changing air.

Newleaf shifting into Greenleaf, comfort turning into abundance.

A big change was coming,as cliche as it was I could feel it in the breeze.

We sat in a crescent shape around a pile of semi-dried herbs and sticks and watched as Raiden crouched besides the pile and sent an arc of electricity to them, the greenery fizzled and began to darken and curl in response to the heat produced by the electric current until after a few more minutes of sizzling,a small flame appeared and the air was filled with the thick smell of burning lavender,mint and sage, my nose twitched, unaccustomed to the heavy herbal scents.

Raiden walked back towards us and settled down besides Ariada, the leafeon's leaves were beginning to whither but neither she or her mate, paid mind to it, instead they focussed on the half moon that floated above our heads.

"What are we waiting for?" I growled folding my feelers.

"For moon-high." Nightmare purred, not taking her eyes of the moon "Stop acting like this is the first fucking time you've been to an Equinox."

"Why do we even do this?"

"It's fucking tradition passed down from generation to generation, the Equinox has been a part of pack culture since the days of the old language."

I growled and began to tangle my feelers up in annoyance, traditions weren't my thing, useless boring rituals, old legends that have been told a million times, and yowling and preaching about gods and goddesses, all while taking it from some badly translated, changed by time,unreliable source.

I hated being dragged to these kind of things, the non-stop preaching about things that I didn't care about or understand,endless exhausting praying in fragmented ancient languages, singing and chanting and the stupid incense that clogged up my nose,dried my eyes and made me light headed.

Yet, here I was.

Solely because Caleo wasn't exactly a nice talkative creature and she would probably burn me to a crisp if I tried to talk about our shared dislike for pack traditions.

I began to untangle my feelers as Raiden stood up and said a few words in fragmented old tongue, why we even used that old language was beyond my was as if no one could decide if the language was dead or alive!

I furled up my feelers deciding that tangling and untangling would probably result in ripping one off or at the very least bring damage to a nerve ending.

It was difficult to tell with these things, when I had first gotten them I had believed that they were cartilage and with the passage of time I had learned that they were terribly sensitive to emotions,slight shifts in the air and as the Mindscape had taught me gravity.

I felt a soft nudge from Nightmare and I lifted my head pretending to pay attention to the story that Raiden was was reciting, the same story, the story about how the four pokemon Shaymin,Xerneas,Verizon and another ledgendary whose name I had forgotten had created the seasons after a long battle for power,it would have been an interesting story if it wasn't repeated every single time we had a ritual connected to the seasons.

I stared at the fire in front of me as Raiden's voice faded into the background,the fumes from the burning herbs while bothersome did not compare to the fumes of burning trash and plastic, the light smoke was nothing if I recalled the thick,dark smog that filled the more….dangerous area of the 'City of the Demons'.

From the mountains and to anyone who had never gone there before; it looked beautiful,a thousand glimmering lights, but to those who had come from the city and its gritty,busy human-filled streets it was all but that.

That city had done a good job of earning its nickname, especially considering the rumors…

A nudge and a brief glare from Nightmare reminded me that I was 'listening' to the story,sheathing and unsheathing my claws I reluctantly began to listen.

"-ch of the gods couldn't wait any longer, because 3 years was just too long to wait. They all had an argument and war broke out between them, the world was in chaos, constantly shifting between the heat of Green-leaf and the chill of Leaf-bare, the awa-"

"How much longer does this have to go on…." I moaned burying my head in my paws.

"Stop acting like a spoiled kit, I'm already dealing with Midnight and her 'I find your traditions stupid' bullshit, so keep your arceus damn complaints to yourself. "

I growled and kept my head buried for the reminder of the story, I knew that Raiden and Nightmare were going to be pissed off by my behavior, but at the moment I couldn't care less.

Eventually the story ended and the praying began, a loud obnoxious mumble of words that asked some face-less venison god for abundance and good health,change to the current situation and the such.

Somehow, despite the constant murmuring and shouts of praise I began to drift off.

A sharp jab brought me back to my senses.

"Arceus damn it Night!" I snapped, jumping to my paws and glaring at the umbreon, almost imediatly the praying stopped and I swallowed as I felt everyone's gaze fall on me,the distinctive crackling sound filled the air and I slowly turned to face Raiden.

The jolteon's fur was so charged that she seemed to be twice her size,sharp needles glowing white at the tips,while electricity jumped from strand to strand in short but loud crackling bursts.

The smell of ozone was heavy in the air and mixed unpleasantly with the scent of herbal smoke, vaguely reminding me of the scents that waffted from some alleyways in the city.

"OUT!" Raiden snapped,I jerked back as a bolt of lightning leapt from her fur and struck the ground where my paws had been with an almost immediate clap of thunder, my mind reeled as I stared at the blackened and steaming grass and earth.

I backed away,passing a quick gaze over my packmates and I winced internally at how they glared at me; with a flick of my now extended feelers and a snarl from Raiden I turned and bolted into the woods.

Once I stopped-going as far as my long legs allowed me,I felt cowardice build up, it certainly hadn't been the first time I had fled,but this time I could have talked my way out of it, my life hadn't been on the line this time.I attempted to shake my head clear of the guilt but it lingered, curling and uncurling the blue and bright pink tips of my feelers I cursed at myself for my stupidity at not using them to calm my packmates down.

At least I was out of the Arceus damn Equinox.

I sat down and licked my flank a few times,ears flicking while my feelers moved along the ground seemingly having a mind of their own as they twitched sensing changes in the air, a sense of dread settled into the pits of my stomach as a result of what they picked up.

The aura was large and warped,difficult to read considering that it didn't belong to a pokemon, the dim aura were an uninteresting shade of grey.A neutral state.

I place a feeler under my chin as I ponder whether or not to investigate,another feeler drifts upwards to scratch the base of my neck and the remaining two coil around the ribbon that was attached to my right ear, they remained loose enough to slightly sense changes in the environment.

The human- male currently wasn't a threat he was sleeping at the least, sleeping a dreamless empty sleep considering the greyness of his aura.

A part of me, hardened by my experiences in the city told me to stay away, no matter how harmless a human seemed they could be horrible creatures; but another side reminded me that not all humans were disgusting and ambitious monsters, the ones that came every New-leaf to check on populations,health and how the forest was maintaining itself were nice, they didn't even interfere or trap us, they only watched from the distance.

My two active feelers curled around my neck ribbon as I made up my mind, I checked the sky, dawn would come soon and I doubted that a human in the forest would be a late sleeper.

I made my way through the undergrowth, my paws light on the ground, feelers swirling around me serving as both a distractor and a sedant, I wasn't hunting but I still prefered that my surroundings remained calm and that others were relatively unaware of my presence.

The human's camp came into view and I curled my upper lip in dislike, the undergrowth was trampled and crudely cut, barley offering any up, dirt-covered logs had evidence of a fire, and a white van was parked at the edge of the makeshift clearing,asleep in the driver's seat was the human.A collection of six pokeballs neatly placed on the seat besides the seemed to be one of the nicer ones, probably just a traveler.

I smiled a bit at that, the dread that had had my nerves buzzing faded ever so slightly, I jumped onto the hood and winced at the loud sound, the human moved a bit and my heartbeat human resumed his snoring and I felt almost amused by him,curious I peered into the back of the man's van.I had expected something like a kitchen or a living room or something that had looked like the human homes I had seen on tv, instead I saw darkness with the faintest hints of a metallic gleam, there was something else…..A long necked creature with long antennae and bright copper colored eyes that gave me a pleading look. The dread and fear it felt flooded my system and mixed with my own a flick of my feelers I jumped off the hood of the van and ran back into the safety of the forest.


End file.
